April 26, 2013

Spring is such a beautiful time to get outdoors and enjoy your days with your children. Cool mornings, warm afternoons, flora and fauna blooming & buzzing wildly. Today a hike in the mountains was just begging to be had. PattyKakesKidz took a 2 mile hike through Rancho San Antonio Mountains all the way up to Deer Hollow Farm. It was just a splendid day all around.

After breakfast, our morning began with the sun on our backs as we hiked with our friends up into the mountains. One of the first things we discussed was safety, as this was a wild environment.

The next thing the kids heard was a very loud gobble gobble gobble. We look across the field and see a very large wild turkey. He was larger than our 5 year old boy and faster than all of us put together.

Next the kids came across a beautiful hollowed out tree. Totally a picture opportunity. "Piper, we miss you", said our kiddos.

Hiking along some more, we came across another field where the tractor was mowing. The kids had to stay for a while to watch this fun.

Just passed the tractor was a great looking dead tree. Of course, another photo

opportunity to be had.

No hike would be complete unless you found a bridge over a small river.

Look closely at the camouflaged lizards. Yes, plural, lizards!

We finally make it to the farm. Looking across the pasture the kids see a small white barn. Inside, was the mama cow who just had her baby calf in February. I'll zoom in.

She watches us too as we call out to her calf. Oh my these are some beautiful farm cows.

And very friendly too.

When we walked across the pasture to the white barn to see mama up close, baby ran across all the way to her and they kissed. We watched as mama cleaned her baby calf and watched them graze.

The kids then ran over to see the chickens and the ducks. They loved this as some of the chickens came jumping over the fence to peck and scratch at the grounds near the kids. They got such a kick out of it.

Peeyooo, what's that smell says one of the kiddos. Oh, just some manure. Huh? Oh, you know; poopy. Oh the kids laughed so hard. Can you spot 2 chickens on top?

Wow, check out the sheep and goats. It was great that there was a step up for the kids to see clearly. Baaa aaaaah.

Next a walk over to the cool vegetable and herb garden. The kids loved checking out all that edible foods. Hey what's that in the back? Oh, that's the different types of composting they have. Check out the worm farm, we have one of those back home at PattyKakesKidz, don't we?

After a nice lunch and learning about, "do not leave any trash behind", we began our journey back home. Hey what's that? Only the biggest tree trunk ever. Can we all fit inside? Yes!

Hiking back, a person walks by and warns us of snakes along the road and at the parking lot. We come across 2 of them. This one above kept rolling over and over. The other one was tearing a hole into the ground making shelter. We kept clear of them though so as not to make them scared of us.

As we come to the end of the road, I just wanted to get this cute shot in of Rachel and baby Cruz. What a trooper he was on this hike. I won't mention the falling, tripping and owies along the way LOL, thank goodness for our lil 1st Aid Kit.

What beautiful kids. I can't believe that 2 of these little guys will be moving on to kindergarten this fall. We will miss them terribly. Love you lil ones ♥

April 19, 2013

Time to reflect and share what learning has taken place here at PattyKakes Kidz. Last night I had a dozen providers over for dinner so I could share ideas on how I run my preschool and show them my set up. After hearing all the ooohs and aaaahs from these wonderful women, it was just then I realized that our little preschool really does do a lot. I love letting the kids play, but as I have mentioned before, we also do schooling. Check out how busy those little kiddos were.

Bugs

Then it was time to bring in some real ones.

These little guys are 3 weeks old and barely the size of the lead on a pencil top.

Next, Fire Drills

Fire drills consisted of role playing (for 2 days they were fire fighters and kids calling 911), worksheets, poster making, story telling, puppet making and pretending. Their favorite was when a translucent red scarf floated in the air and landed on one of the children. They shouted, Stop-Drop-Roll and they rolled all over the floor until the scarf fell off of them. So much fun.

V is for Vase

W is for Whale

(poster includes worksheet and booklet too)

the X booklet

(4"x6")

and X is for Xylophone

The Study of our Weather

Dolch Word Practice

This is a 4 x 6 foot white board above.

and this is a 8.5 x 11 paper.

The kids were only aloud to write the words if they could read them. It looks like everyone was reading and writing that day.

Santa Clara County Office of Ed.

Story Time Fieldtrip

My yellow shirt kids almost make up the whole class.

Forest Animals

We learned about forest animals, then made puppets, put them all together and showed them in their habitats.

Bear, porcupine, fox, rabbit, owl, moose, beaver.

Number 14

(our number for the week)

The poster for 14. They cut out 14 acorns, counted them and glued them to the acorn tree. They added a squirrel (cuz squirrels eat them right LOL?) and colored the number 14.

Park Day

(Houge Park)

I couldn't stop taking pictures of the kids coming down the slide because it was just so hilarious to see their hair standing up. This led to a discussion on static electricity. (then it led to me running from them as they chased me to shock me LOL)

What a great week we had here. So much done, so much to do, with such a wonderful group of kids.

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About Our Preschool

PattyKakes Kidz is a small Preschool and Childcare program designed to provide a safe and educationally enriched environment for your child. Each child will experience home away from home where we not only offer a homelife learning environment, but where we explore our world and all it has to offer. I can be emailed at pattykakeskidz at yahoo dot com.